Obligatory Weekly Post

I had big goals for this week, but wasn't able to meet all of them. My running has been going really well, and swimming started out promising this week, too. Like a dumbass, though, I decided to up the weights in one of my strength sets, and that was the start of a chain reaction that culminated with me waking up really, really sick on Friday. So sick that being vertical was mostly out of the question. Luckily, I had moved my Friday run to Thursday and got it done in style, so all it meant was that I missed my long swim. Fuck. I have started to like them! But, I am learning what I can and cannot take and considering it's just December, it was a good idea to just lay low on Friday. I couldn't work, either, so it was basically get up and take some cold medicine and lay back down. I was completely exhausted. I couldn't find any greatly enlarged lymph nodes on my neck (I know where to find them which helps me evaluate viral vs. bacterial infection), but I was sneezing up a storm and the left side of my nose was running. Which was good, because I could breathe pretty well out of the right side!

I literally did nothing on Friday except lay around, eat soup, take cold medicine, repeat. I fell asleep for good really early and slept really well. When I awoke on Saturday, I even had a taste for coffee, and I felt better than Friday, so thought I'd try getting on the bike. I could spin, but the energy just wasn't there, so after almost an hour, I bagged it, took a shower and put my PJ's back on for the duration. I wasn't really sleepy, but still fatigued, so I laid on the couch and watched a bunch of skiing on Universal Sports, then watched Ironman Hawaii.

Different people have different views on what they want to see in the NBC coverage--thing is, it isn't ours to dictate, but in general, I think they do a pretty good job. I mean, hey, an Ironman on network TV? Watching one in person can be like watching paint dry, and the fact it's on at all is remarkable in this day and age of biggest fatty, loser parenting and "look at me" reality shows, none of which I personally watch. I usually get teary eyed at the "stories," and this year was no exception. The woman who had had a stroke impressed me. The navy guy who trained on a submarine REALLY impressed me. Of course, Rudy Tolson impressed me. People who are not bitching and moaning about their lives, and they go and grab it and kick it in the nuts and still do an Ironman. THAT is what it's about to me. Any of the rest of us who have a "normal" life without significant disabilities, enough money to buy a nice bike and tons of gear have no right whatsoever to complain. And if you suck at Ironman, hey, it's your own choice. You can choose to honor the race and train for it properly, or you can just be a fucking medal whore and do it so you can check it off your bucket list. That is fine, too.

Doing an Ironman doesn't make any of us any better than anyone else. I hate it when people bitch and moan about their training, how they wish they could do more. You are either CHOOSING to make enough time to train the way you think you should train, or you aren't. If you aren't, shut the fuck up. Don't do Ironman. Nobody cares if you do it or not. Nobody cares about your finish time like 2 weeks after the race. It is just how it is. There are more important things in life for most people. So why, you ask, am I so obsessed with training? It just is. I have figured out how to make time to train the way that I want to train most of the time, and I generally do not bitch about it. Sure it is stressful at times, but nobody said it would be easy. I do not want it to be easy. I want it to be the thing that prevents me from being average in my own head. It is not for anyone else or to show anyone else anything. It is just a way I have found of pushing myself. That is it. I am nobody, and I don't care what anyone thinks about what I am doing.

OK that was a bit of a tangent. So during last night, I notice that my nose is not running at all, and I am breathing well, and I want to get out of bed. But I stay in until it is almost light out, getting 10.5 hours. I stand up and do not feel weak. I want coffee. I want to move around. So I pack everything for a long run and a short recovery swim, including a can of Coke, and head to the Y. I wore my HTFU bracelet because I figured I'd need it today. I had noticed that my back didn't feel too great, probably from all the laying around I'd done the prior 2 days (immobility is bad for me). My feet felt wrong because I'd been wearing slippers for 2 days with absolutely no support in them.

Oh well, I got on the treadmill and didn't feel bad at all. I kept punching in the workout speeds, and only drank Gatorade for the first 1.5 hours, and then I started in on Coke, and it tasted good. I just kept going, staring at a blank TV screen (I can't watch anything while I'm on the machine), with the occasional passer-by waving to me. As I got to the last :45 which included tempo pace, I started to feel a little tired, but not too bad. Since I didn't feel like I had a cold anymore, and I'd had plenty of sleep, I just toughed it out, but once I got on the track (with :15 to go), I felt tired. Still, I got it done, and ended up at 18.25 miles in 2:45. I had to decide whether to swim or not, but first I stretched a bit because I was extra tight from all the running and from not doing anything for 2 days, and that felt good.

I decided to hop in the pool, and it felt great to swim. Guess my little break was OK. I did 1500 yards real easy, got out, showered and hit the sauna. Two young girls were in there chatting up a storm. I was just trying to do some upper body stretches while seated. Another woman came in and commented about my swimming and I guess she's seen me before and she asked how much I swam each time, and at this point I was pretty tired, but wanted to be cordial, so I said, "Do you really want to know?" She said yes, because it looked like I swam a lot, and I just chuckled, and I told her about how much I've been swimming, and she asked how much stuff I did per week, and well, the whole S/B/R thing came out, and one of the young girls asked if I would mind sharing my age with her, which I did. Even though I felt like I'd exorcised the cold, I could tell my voice was pretty low and I was tired, but I stayed engaged in the conversation. I know I'm an oddity, so if someone asks, I will tell, but usually I just stay quiet.

So, my training hours were cut short missing a long swim and ride, but the prime directive was running anyway, and I got that done. I will wait and see how I feel later on today (other than just tired!) in terms of being fully cured. So only 14.3 hours this week, will see if I can raise that a bit with a nice 5-mile swim and really long ride next Saturday. Running gets tapered this week, but I am still shooting for a 15-miler on Wednesday. We'll see how things progress. Mainly, I hope to wake up tomorrow feeling normal!

A Very Special Crackheaded Announcement

Those of you who are friends on Facebook have seen me alluding to something today that I promised I would unveil here on the blog first.

I almost don't even know how to talk about it. It came to me in the middle of last night. I had been struggling with do I or do I not do IM Canada? It's not the "doing" of it that's an issue--it's the travel and I hadn't made any plans, and as much as I know I could go back there and kick the course's ass, I just haven't felt the need to end this season with another WTC/NAS (or whatever the fuck it is now) Ironman (I am already doing IMLP). It would have, indeed, been fun to meet some people face to face that I've never met before, fun to do the race, all that stuff.

But my heart, while still broken, has needed something else to revive me, to make me feel alive and challenged and maybe lead me to that next step. I'm signed up for a 50-mile trail race in October, I'm going back to Goofy Challenge (which is no big deal to me) in January, and I had thought about doing a "double Ironman" training week in 2010. I had also talked about a sequence of triathlons with an impressive total distance sometime earlier this year with someone, but it was expressed in terms of "next year." Well, you know what? I'm training pretty well, I'll have IMLP as a warmup race (and I do intend to race that) and being undecided about IM Canada, last night I thought what the fuck let's do this thing THIS YEAR.

So initially the thought was 4 days (and these are all "do it on my own" fuck actual races I don't need no stinkin' medals or T-shirts):

• Day 1: Sprint
• Day 2: Olympic distance
• Day 3: Half Ironman distance
• Day 4: Ironman distance

But then I add up some numbers and think, huh, that's close to double Ironman but not quite. So while stuck in traffic this afternoon (only to return to a house with no power, but obviously it's back on, thank GOD because it's still 91 here), I figure out how it's going to go. This will begin on August 24, 2009:

• Monday, August 24: Run 3.8 miles or so. This is just to get the total run miles for the week up to 52.4, which is double Ironman.
• Tuesday, August 25: Rest day
• Wednesday, August 26: Sprint (sort of) of 1500m swim/20-mile bike/5K run
• Thursday, August 27: Olympic (sort of) of 2000m swim/30-mile bike/10K run
• Friday, August 28: Half Ironman (sort of) of 2500m swim/60-mile bike/13.1 mile run
• Saturday, August 29: Ironman (sort of) of 4000m swim/115-mile bike/26.2 mile run

And the total is 10,000m swimming, 225 miles biking and 52.4 miles running.

Can I do it? Well, I've done the whole sprint/Oly/Half Ironman before. No big deal. Part of Triple T. It's that pesky Ironman thing at the end that will be tough. So I will be leaning on some friends for advice--I think I know how to pace this, and I have to find places to get it done. I'm OK swimming in the outdoor 50m pool, and riding from there. I think I will need to do the half and full IM runs on trail, though, which will necessitate some transportation or something.

I have time to figure out the logistics!

Am I going to ask if anyone wants to come along with me? FUCK NO! I am assuming I will be doing this all by myself. If once I post where the hell I will be while rolling someone wants to show up and swim/ride/run along with me or just clap or look at me like I'm fucking insane, that's perfectly fine by me.

Even though I won't be doing sanctioned races, I am hoping that if I decide to submit an application for Ultraman Kona, that they will consider me appropriately loony but qualified to race there. That has been one of my goals for several years now, and it's time to start making good on it, eh?

Now this all begs the question WHY??? Why is because I think I can do it, but it's also somewhat scary, because this is how I feed my soul, because this is how I exorcise demons that seem to plague me only leaving me when I push myself to another place, and because once I lock in on something that I think I should do, I'm already doing it.

I've had enough of doing it for the prize, the glory, frankly I don't give a shit what anyone thinks of me anymore.

I might fail at this; but I might not. All I can do is tri, right?

24 Hours--In a Day? No, in a Training Week!

Seeing where I was in total training hours earlier today, I decided I needed to make it to 24 hours for the week beginning 6/20 just because. Why? Because I've never done it before, or so I thought. So I went back and checked on my biggest weeks ever, and there was a 23 something 2 years ago. What the hell, let's go for 24!

I had put off strength training this week because I was pretty trashola, but felt like I could put some in today even after a 14-something run. So I did what I thought I needed to do (leaving out most of my deltoids work due to my bum right deltoid), and got up to 56 minutes, which was enough. This left me needing like 12 more minutes, so of course, I hopped on CF and rode around a little bit just to tip everything over 24 hours!

Isn't that cool to have done this 3 weeks out from an Ironman (good timing) and when I'm already 51? Geez, let me tell you 24 hours is A LOT of training. A REAL LOT! I also decided maybe a few days ago that in 2009 I want to do a training week where I cover double Ironman distance. Looking at what I just did, I would need to put in more running, could get by on less swimming and a bit less biking. I tell you, adding about 18 miles more of running will not be an easy thing to do! But this is something I think I need to do--now I just need to decide when and how to structure the week to get it in. I'm pretty sure I will need to treat it as if I'd done an Ironman on the last day and recover from it accordingly. I'm kind of excited now thinking about doing this plus RAINSTORM and Triple T next year. Holy crap, if I don't get strong from that, I don't know how I'd be any stronger! This seems like a planning nightmare, but I think I can get it together.

I'm really pumped up about planning for this now. I need to get someone else to sign onto my plans for 2009. I bet I can rope Blink into this shit...it would be easy for him!